was diagnosed 9 months ago with
type 2 diabetes. Currently I am taking
200 mg Rezulin [a diabetes pill for people with Type 2 diabetes] with food
in the morning. My fasting blood sugar is always in the 80-95 range. Have
been keeping tight control.
HbA1c
came back 4.9.
My question is: how do you come to the decision to stop oral medications and
see if diet and exercise alone can work? I would like to stop the
Rezulin. I wonder if it working too well. An example: fasting blood sugar
of 90, eat
breakfast and blood sugar
goes to 127 in 1½ hours, then back down into the mid 80's within 3/4 of an
hour.
Answer:
Frequently, after taking diabetes pills for a while, and working hard on eating right and exercising regularly,
(and probably also losing a few excess pounds), Type 2 patients notice lower and lower blood sugar levels.
The decision to stop oral agents when the blood sugars look good is
arbitrary. It's largely dependent on whether you expect you'll be likely to
continue to work on the meal plan and exercise, and not have any unusual
stress events coming up (like weddings, moves, etc.) that would mess up
your diabetes control.
All the factors involved with the pill should be considered in making the
decision to stop. You and your physician should talk over what factors are
important in your case. For example, you are on a low dose of your pill,
and it might turn out that it really isn't needed for blood sugar control
at this stage. Drugs such as Rezulin are expensive, and Rezulin does have a warning about possible liver
disease, so stopping it if it's not really needed is worth a try.
If you're in the mood to try without the diabetes pill, tell your doc you
want to stop it for a trial basis. Continue to check your blood sugars
frequently during the trial, and see what happens. And let your doc know
later how you are doing without it.
